/sci/ - Science & Math

Been there, done that.

I guess inurdaes is asleep

>>3078346
He is here
>>3078269

The Venus Project is a marketing scam.

>>3078400
o yea?

>>3078403

Yes, now stop posting. This idea is fucking retarded.

That's not to say we should try to move towards a "utopian" world, but discussing shit like this is a waste. I can't support a project about a free world where they're selling videos for 40 dollars.

>>3078420

>he doesn't understand fundraising

Also, it was explicitly stated that the thread is not just about the venus project.

>utopia

ahahahaha you want to build a private island are you retarded

ahahahaha you don't want to build a private island are you retarded

1/3

2/3

3/3

>>3078468
>>3078471
>>3078474

if this was ever to come about, id devote my whole life attempting to destroy it

>>3078569

This is probably pointless, but I'm going to ask anyway.

What specifically do you find to be bad?

Posting. What's up?

Last I heard TZM and TVP weren't speaking to each other because TVP was trying to make a major motion picture (a fruitless and expensive goal) about the ideas.

That said, I really want to see how the world will actually react to automation taking over the service sector. I'm sure it won't be positive but it'll be good for a laugh in a
>they don't want the robot to relieve them from backbreaking labor
kinda way.

>>3078593
The Venus Project is basically something what a stupid angsty 15 year old kid like Inuradaes would support.

ever read 1984 bro?.. but generally (in danger of sounding like an amerifag) the lack of freedom. all it would take would be a couple of corrupt individuals at the top and this would all go a bit pear shaped.. i like the idea though.

>>3078605
TvP is imbalanced for protoss dude,
As toss - I don't get super happy when I see Terran. I feel more relaxed vs zerg actually. Besides, any major imbalances will most likely get worked out eventually. If your leaning towards Terran, I feel there's no major reason to switch to toss.
Also this rule: - Nothing is imba. If you found something imba, it's most likely not. Find a counter. This is no place for balance discussion.

Look at this image, it's even funnier.

>>3078468
>>3078471
>>3078474
That version of Utopia has about 70% good ideas and then 30% of 'what the fuck is this 1984 crap'

>>3078621

elaborate on the 30% percent, and if at all possible add suggestions to fix/improve them.

>>3078615
>Besides, any major imbalances will most likely get worked out eventually.

>>3078609
I dislike the Venus Project. Incredibly naive views on crime, and you cannot give unlimited resources to everyone immediately without some form of limiting resource consumption. We're nowhere near the true post-scarcity tech.
Not to mention the amount of conspiracy surrounding Zeitgeist, what the fuck
>>3078616
Yayyy I have a fanclub
That saves nearly everything they scrounge up on me by the first page of Google

>>3078621

Book by george orwell of a similar idealistic totalitarian state. coined the term 'big brother'. its not the best read but its message is very poignant

There will never be a utopia. Trying to build one is foolish.

>>3078631
Nearly perfectly circle cities. I can understand streamlining the design to cut down on urban sprawl but what the fuck?
As for requiring government permission to form a baby, or requiring that the two parents MUST be with each other for a child?
That's just a few bits of the shit which left me thinking 'this totally isn't exceedingly authoritarian'
It's like having a fairly left libertarian society and then introducing these oddly fascist rules into play regarding people's personal lives.

>>3078647
You're correct. I mean, how to you define a perfect society? It's impossible. However we can make it a shitload better.

>>3078647

Afraid for change, are we?

>>3078634
>Incredibly naive views on crime,

Explain.

It'd be hard to avoid it becoming a dystopia.

>>3078647
>>3078655

Agreeing with Inurades.

Utopia assumes that there is an ideal static state for humans. However the needs and desires of humans will change as you move towards a previously Utopian goal. Thus Utopia is unattainable as it is a constantly changing goal.

>>3078671

>He doesn't understand dynamic equilibrium

>>3078671
yes

>>3078655
Define 'better' in this context so that it is universally agreeable. Good luck.
Oh, and we are talking about societies, not technologies!

>>3078656
1) Change for the sake of change is only certain to be different, not better
2) No, I'm not, I am just not utopian.
I have rather developed opinions about civil structures, if you are interested.

>>3078647
>>3078671

I hate people like you

>YEW KANT PLZ ERRY1 SO ITS POINTLESS TO TRY

Yeah, I mad.

Societies like this should be feared. this isnt a million miles away from that new world order bs

>>3078684
>YEW KANT PLZ ERRY1 SO ITS POINTLESS TO TRY

Never said that, the world can be improved to better fill the real needs and desires of the people but 'Utopia' is a ridiculous a concept as 'God'.

>>3078658
They were basically going;
"If we have a RBE and treat people right, we don't need prisons because there won't be criminals! The REALLY violent ones, we'll just rehabilitate them."

This won't work. It might, after a whole century of the world working like that. It's likely not even then will that be able to hold up. But yes, the severe reduction in negative experiences that scar a person's psyche will drastically reduce the amount of crime. More so when monetary deprivation is no longer a factor.

>>3078671

Humanity will fracture.

Instead of large nation states small groups will go and do their own thing trying to build a 'utopia'.

Building you won nation state will be trivial once space habitats become possible.

>>3078684
I'm not saying 'don't try to improve things'. I'm saying 'utopia can't be achieved'.
Big fucking difference.

>>3078663

A Dystopia would be rather formed on the lack of will to form an Utopia.
A few (one/two) extremely talented inviduals will eventually get fed up with this planet's narrowminded population, and eventually get in control, while being filled with hatred towards humanity.

And believe me, the nightmare that will come out of this is far beyond any human scenario has even been able to describe so far.

OP does not appreciate the vast complexities of such an undertaking. There are so many economic and political factors that you have not thought of. unless you have a PPE from oxbridge. gtfo

>>3078700
>>3078695

u·to·pi·a
   [yoo-toh-pee-uh] Show IPA
–noun

an ideal place or state.

Hmmm... maybe I need to get lasik, because I don't see the word perfect in there...

Another reason I hate people like you guys. You can't understand metaphors, and try to be edgy by being overly technical.
>HURR DURR PERFECTION IZ IMPOSSIBL

Do you really think you're the only person who realized this?
Utopia is simply being used as the best possible state, no one claims it to be perfect.

You fags are the reason why the world is shit.

we'r being realists here, sorry bro.

>>3078746

Oh please, it were realists that claimed the world never would need more then 5 computers.

what do you call a society whose primary goal is technological advancement? Where instead of politicians only the most qualified individuals are put into leadership positions in their respective field.

>>3078771
Technocracy/Meritocracy

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technocracy
>Technocracy is a form of government in which engineers, scientists, health professionals and other technical experts are in control of decision making in their respective fields.

TRS = Technocratic Republic of Sci

>>3078771

Technocracy.

>>3078737
>>an ideal place or state
>>ideal place or state
>>ideal
>>"I don't see the word perfect in there'

I see why you're posting about metaphor on /sci/, not /lit/

>>the Venus Project has the goal of eliminating all crime, poverty, hunger, unemployment, pollution, resource depletion, negative technology impact, nationalism, bigotry, prejudice, elitism, etc.

Yeah, they aren't trying to be perfect. After all, transforming ourselves into energy beings is phase II.

Again, I am actually pretty involved in social transformation theory and am considered fringe by a lot of people, so this isn't about 'change bad' this is about 'first steps'

>>3078782
I am actually a pretty big fan of modified technocracy

>>3078805
Glad to hear of it. Are you talking about the modified technocracy I propose or another?

hmm technocracy. I like it. Im probably not smart enough to live in one thou. How would the education system work?

>>3078808
more of a feudal, distributist core with technocratic motivations; strictly limited constitutional monarchy with a distributist economic system and an aristocracy composed of technocratic elites that are, typically, non-hereditary.

Perhaps a technocracy could could exist among other countries trading new technology for resources that they cant provide for themselves? Always keeping the good stuff for themselves and having superior weapon techs just in case they were seen as a threat.

>>3078821
Loads of critical thinking. And lots of advanced technologies for teaching. Something around the level of what the end of Z: Moving Forward showed. Heavily based about making it fun for the kids and to teach them critical/lateral thinking.
For instance, in the Australian Science and Mathematics school, they don't have high school math lessons like OKAY CLASS WE'RE DOING THESE FRACTION MULTIPLICATION CRAP TODAY and then being fed the information how to do it and then copy into your book so that you remember for the test. It was based about completely chucking books out the window and getting the students to use shit like Google and similar sites to Khan Academy to learn what it is and all the components. Then you'd write up a relatively simple report outlining what each part of a equation/math topic is and etc etc.
It really helped burn into people's heads for a long time. You felt like you had more of a grasp on the topic.
Of course that's just some of the shit that'd be different. I am really disappointed at how an institution could make learning about shit like sciences and so forth boring. What the bleeding fuck.

>>3078872
I would prefer a majority homeschooled solution, personally

>>3078902
Your option. I would like to see some form of measure of a person's ability to function as an intelligent adult with all the variables in homeschooling in different families. I'm not talking about a few tests either.

>>3078905
Well, the first generation of homeschoolers are well into adulthood, now....
Also, as I point out to people, human beings being able to interact with each other in meaningful ways did not magically appear in the mid-20th Century when schooling became mandatory (insert the appropriate time for your local conditions).

>>3078902

that explains so much...

I'm going to reread our arguments now knowing that you are full retard.

>>3078923
???
So I homeschool my kids, so what?
Oh, you think *I* am homeschooled? Dude, I'm 43

>>3078923
Were you homeschooled?

hey guys,
who cleans the public toilets?

>>3079206
automated.

>>3078698
I can agree with that assessment, though the important point is that the people who'd still need to be in prison would be a small fraction of what are currently in there.

>>3078902
>home schooling

Pretty easy to do even today with use of the internet.

>>3079206
>who cleans the public toilets?
In case you missed it: it's been done with automation already.

>>3078872
>I am really disappointed at how an institution could make learning about shit like sciences and so forth boring. What the bleeding fuck.

Kinda like my high school chemistry... all of it was math which was stripped of meaning.

>Utopian society general.

We are already planting the seeds for this. Look up the visions of "industrial" robots for the coming years. They are not twelve ton welding monsters for 100k+ each, they are padded 20kg easily installable units with computer vision/learning meant to operate next to, or instead of people.

>>3079206

Don't bother trying to point out the stupidity of utopian technophiles, their solution to everything is LOL MAGIC. I even know one idiot who claims the routine maintainance and repair of the automated systems would itself be automated.

>TurtlesAllTheWayDown.jpg

>>3079346
0/10
Try harder luddite

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5ul7prwoiM

>>3079353

Whatever help you sleep at night, tard. You idiots are worse than Communists, at least they don;t claim to know what their impossible utopia will look like in advance.

for a project bent on discarding money, their videos are sure overpriced.

Also, venus project will never actualize cause bitches love money. As soon as you are all working class citizens EARNING your cash instead of it being spoon fed to you, you'll understand.

>>3079372
>As soon as you are all working class citizens EARNING your cash instead of it being spoon fed to you, you'll understand.

Your tears are delicious

>>3079372
All anyone needs to do is look at the Atlantis Project from about 20 years ago; much more reasonable goals, better timeline, focused on technological development - and it still went bankrupt.

It was too big. These things need to come about through local, incremental steps

>>3079377
>ThisIsWhatSocialistsActually Believe.jpg

And you say OUR tears are delicious? Your whole ideology is founded on envy and a PROFOUND lack of understanding of how economies work.

mfw no one in this society is willing to make my cheddar cheese

>>3079346
> claims the routine maintainance and repair of the automated systems would itself be automated.
It's not unreasonable, given modularity and the right sensors you could just replace the failed part with a spare one and ship the faulty unit for either recycling or human-inspected repair at a centralized workshop.

Fault sensors are an ancient concept, and so is modularity and easy replacement, it's just that the relevant infrastructure and tools for doing this automated have never been implemented for most purposes.

Although things like the semiconductor industry with automated testing and correction of errors in circuits do show it's not a bullshit concept.

Now of course if you think that no one would work as a human repairman, just offer free blowjobs for the mechanics as a work benefit and pay the blowjobbers by allowing them priority to the latest gadgets and give them luxurious homes within some limits(three times bigger homes, priority for latest ipad/smartphone models). Point being that a moderate award should be a good enough incentive, no need to do as today where a CEO(that's not a very important person still) get paid 500x normal wages.

>>3079417
>Full retard

>>3079397
>how economies work

They work exactly how they're designed to work, shits just religion 3.0 after all.

>>3079397

Which nation's economy can honestly be said to "work"?

>>3079372
>working class citizens EARNING your cash instead of it being spoon fed to you
The american working class is being spoonfed money by the upper segments. It was better a few decades ago when the working class actually earned somethign qualifying as real fucking money isntead of being treated like chinese sweatshop wage slaves.

>>3079428

Economies aren't designed, numbnuts, they arise spontaneously in all human groups. Modern economies are MANAGED, which is not at all the same as designing them: The only people who thought you could design an economy where the Bolsheviks, and they quickly learned how wrong they were.

>>3079425
>No counterargument
>Butthurt
>Defaulting on meme-spouting.
Even the american economy have more creativity to avoid defaulting.

>>3079437

Work perfectly? None of them, but then no human institution is ever perfect. Work tolerably? Well, Western economies have done pretty fucking well over the past ~200 years, huge wars notwithstanding.

>>3079449
Explain economies using physics.

Exactly you can't, they don't actually exist.

>>3079453

There's nothing to reply to, you're simply an idiot. That you don't realize this is your tragedy.

>>3079458
>Well, Western economies have done pretty fucking well over the past ~200 years, huge wars notwithstanding.

Depends on who you are.

>>3079460
>Explain languages using physics.
>Exactly you can't, they don't actually exist.

>>3079475

No, it doesn't. Even the poorest in our society are VASTLY better off now than their equivalents 200 years ago.

>>3079485
-100000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
00000000000000000000000000000000000000/10

>>3079464

You should familiarise yourself with this chart.
Who knows, you might actually learn something.

>>3079503
lol thinking what i was thinking

>>3079503

He provided a non-argument, I provided a non-reply. The circle of life is complete.

>>3079500
>>3079503

>Chart mind

>>3079503
But, that chart is horrible at displaying fallacies.

>>3079464
>Maximum Butthurt
>Still can't form a coherent counterargument
>Foaming mouth
>Smashing keyboard
>Hey lets call him a sad idiot! Of man that's innovative!
What's next, frustrated nerdrage because i've insulted your bullshit opinion?

>>3079485
living on the streets scrounging for food.

>>3079512

Are you illiterate?
Because I am pretty sure he provided an lenghty argument for his case.
You failed to point our any errors or inconsistancies in that argument and instead used ad hominems.

So, you are either lazy, illiterate or a very bland troll.

>>3079520

Such as?

I feel like i'm in parliament with all these name callings and arguments with no substances.

>>3079523
>>3079534
>My point: Turtles all the way down
>His point: HURR DURR LOOK AT THIS TURTLE

But since you seem unable to understand the simplest point without having it spelt out to you...

Making maintenance automated simply means you now have a bunch of automated repair robots that need maintaining. You can't have robots repairing themselves for what I hope are obvious reasons, at some point you need a person.

>ITT: hurr durr utopia = impossible/perfection retards

A couple of years ago a world without slavery was a utopia. Even more years ago a world where we live past 40 was a utopia.

>>3079529

How many beggars starve to death in our society? I'll give you a clue: It's none. Now look up how many starved to death 200 years ago. And that's even without considering the kind of welfare available to beggars in most western countries, up to and including free housing for those who want it (in the EU, probably not in America).

>>3079569
If all of your repair robots repair each other, what is the problem?

>>3079569

You obiviously didn't read his argument.
It was pretty vclearly stated that the society could provide many non monetary incentives for the humans themselves to maintain the robots.
In his example, blwojobs.

Read the oposing argument before you start spouting insults. It makes you look stupid.

>>3079588

Really? You want me to explain to you why that is a terrible idea? Ask me again when you're out of high school, kid.

>>3079607

Then he agrees with me that you can't automate repairs. Jesus Christ you people are stupid.

>>3079569
>You can't have robots repairing themselves for what I hope are obvious reasons, at some point you need a person.
The robots are not repairing themself, other robots are repairing them.

Anyway, why not? If a robot breaks down after 5000 hours of work, and in that time the individual robot can build 5 copies of itself then we have four surplus robots per broken robot. A predefined recycling scheme for the broken robots could allow for reassembly of the majority of broken robots too.

And if we have modular robots with proper sensors that breakdown may be limited to "replace a servo motor in 20 minutes of work".

>Because humans are needed for everything by default.
Is a very, very shitty argument.

>>3079608
As long as you have at least one active, functional repair robot, it can fix other repair robots, provided that the necessary materials are available. If you have a swarm of repair robots, all capable of fixing each other, the swarm is self-repairing.

What's the problem?

>>3079626
>>3079640

OK clearly you guys are even dimmer than I thought. On the plus side, that means your moronic idea will never get anywhere near being tried out IRL. On the other hand, it means I've just wasted 30 minutes of my life that I will never get back. Lesson learnt, I guess.

>>3079651
So you're just going to keep trolling? Okay. Whatever works for you, I guess.

>>3079621

You were the one to even bring that up.
Right here: >>3079346
No one was arguing for the full automatisation of rapairs, what Deerp Tought was merely stating was that it could be automated to some degree.
No one argued for the full removal of human element.

You have been strawmannig and insluting the other people in this thread since you showed up and we are supposed to be the stupid ones?

>inuardes

lol that atheist idiot who thinks he can make a communist utopia with "science" in the middle of australia? no thanks

Global Minimum Wage
So capitalism becomes less about exploitation and resource control, and more about efficiency and quality product

>>3079682

Institutions do not abide by capitalism, the competition between small businesses in the United States is much more akin to capitalism that what banks and large corporation are doing.

>>3079651
full retard

>hurr durr capitalism is evil, stupid decadent amerifats, viva la revolution!
Collectives in practice are just bureaucracies with the same corruption and limitations as every other bureaucracy, there is nothing distinctly special about a "worker's council" or a "people's republic" just because they value socialism.

This is a major logical fallacy in marxism, you're basically just self-justified and dogmatic. It is possible for a reasonably intelligent logical impartial person to value the same things as a socialist, yet disagree with the actual practical policies set out by socialists.

>>3079663
That aside, there's no reason you can't have robots repairing other robots, as long as there's regular inputs of energy into the system (which would be needed to run an active system anyway).

Fully automated manufacturing + fully automated recycling = fully automated repair. It's even easier if you have regular inputs of fresh raw materials and a place to dump trash: then you don't need the automated recycling part.

As long as the system is capable of making all of its own individual parts, and there are enough redundancies in the system that it can continue working while it replaces broken parts, the system can be capable of replacing any of its own parts as they break down.

>>3079682
quality products and minimum wage laws = higher costs

higher costs = lower demand

lower demand = lowered economic stimulation

lowered economic stimulation = less technological advancement

communists idiots like you and inurdaes always think they know best, but the truth is they are just trapped in a 13 year olds mind. everyone at 13 thought they could be "president of the world" and fix everything. the communist atheists on this site and in this country are truly sickening. idiots like you have started their "own countries" and even their own empires all throughout history and they have always failed. stop thinking that because you read Dawkins that somehow your retarded utopia will be any better

>>3079577
Suuuuuure it was.

>>you haven't looked up the definition of Utopia
>>you don't know the history of Utopian plans and planners
>>You haven't read the book 'Utopia' by More

protip: the book 'Utopia' was a satire of people who thought that they could build an ideal society. Thus the name of the island ["Utopia" means "No Place"]

You can dream about an ideal society but if it will ever come it will be a result of a decades-long, step-by-step process. Not a radical change from shithole to Utopia.
Our generation should concentrate on the present problems and try to solve at least some of them.

>>3079748
you said what I was trying to say; thanks.
And there will be setbacks. The Communist experiments were utopian plans that set back global quality of life decades, for example.

>>3079682
The problem with minimum wage is that it treats employment primarily as a way of providing income to people, rather than accomplishing work, which can introduce arbitrary levels of inefficiency into the economy.

If you're going to add socialistic aspects to your society, it's better to go straight to minimum income: some amount which is simply disbursed by the government to every person.

The practical issues with this are more obvious, but less severe than in the first case.

>>3079722

You still haven't figured out people aren't using the word utopia as the one from 'Utopia'?

Actually it was a double entendre meaning 'good place'

Quit being such a fag and leave.

Some one doesn't know the difference between post scarity and communism.

Pro tip:
They are completely differend. Communism is the equal distribution of limited resources. The post scarity is when there is no meaningful limit to goods or services, making them basically free.This could be achived by massive automation of production and high energy acces.

Currently, post scarity is of course impossible, because of our current technologial limitations. We don't jet have chep enough robotics to automate the production, and our energy production is too inefficent. Once these obstacles have been tacled, only thing standing between us and post scarity is ourselves.

Capitalism is going to eventually bring us near post scarity, because it drives improvement of technology. We will see if the old powerbbase of the corporations and those who benefit from them are willing to make the neccecary chainges to society to allow the realisation of post scarity.

>>3079773
>it was a double entendre meaning 'good place'
It's a phonetic double entendre (with "Eutopia"), but he chose the "Utopia" spelling to plant himself firmly on the side of mockery.

>>3079781
As long as people are allowed to reproduce, there can be no such thing as "post-scarcity".

Regardless of any constant factors involved, exponential population growth outruns even the cubic growth of light speed colonization of space, and eventually must be restrained by some combination of discipline, misery, and death.

Post-scarcity is simply a failure of imagination in the face of (the scenario of) an enormous increase in total wealth.

I agree that the monetary system is wrong but it cant be abolished. (at least not right now) But it should be improved. I'm so mad when I see people get rich without doing anything meaningful or being useful to society or technology. What are the use of brokers nowadays?

>>3079773
>>"Don't you DARE tell me what a word really means - words mean what I say they mean"

I see that you finally went to Wikipedia. Cute. But the argument 'it was a double meaning' is bullshit, since it was written in Latin with Greek place names, thus the entire 'U/Eu/English homophone' statement is laughable.
I also would like to point to another Greek name he used to point out that it was a satire; the river Anhydrous.

>>so be ignorant somewhere else

Well. What's going on in this thread...

>>3078468

"Every single square foot of the nation will be under video surveillance"

I can't be the only one who sees the Perversion Potential here, right?

>>No Marraiges, noone can have children without government intervention.

Eh.. again... this is kind of a naive view. What happens if these rules are broken?

>> Expecting children to be able to live on their own at age 5.

Oooookkkaay. Was this written by an angsty 14 year old, bitter about the control his parents have over him, preventing him from doing idiotic shit?

>> Involuntary research as punishment for crime.

Uh. Did nobody consult ethicists before writing this shit?

This really sounds more like a totalitarian dystopia to me. It's like communism. On paper you get Peace and Brotherhood. In practice you get Mao and Stalin.

>>3079817
I have realized this since I was 10 years old or so, learning about population growth in history books.

Why is it that the majority of people do not consider it a problem?

Utopia is only possible if we maintain capitalism and advance technology.

CAPITALISM FUCK YEAH!!!

>>3079817
>>exponential population growth
You don't read demographics journals, do you? NO professional demographer thinks human population is going to continue to grow post-2150 and there is a group of demographers that make a pretty good argument that human population is peaked *now*, +/- a few tens of millions. The major issue that demographers and long-range economists are focused on is the imminent population *crash*.

>>3079817

And who says that the population would be allowed to grow?
If this is a technocracy we are talking about, there would surely be some forms of population controll in place.

Besides, the situation in Western Europe has proved that as the quality of life increases, the avarage number of children decrases. This exponental population growth you are talking about is only conserning the les developed contries.

In post scarity, people would most likely to be too busy with their hobbies and fulfilling their fantacies to bother with the responcibility of raising children. With contraceptives available, I doupt that there would be remarcable population growth.

>>3079841
Because no serious analysis of demographics data ever supported the fear-mongering of overpopulation pushed by the media, the environmentalists, and groups like the Club of Rome. The UN Population Group was projecting a human population peak and drop-off in the 1960's, before Ehrlich's Population Bomb, and the peak population has been sooner and lower every time they have looked at the numbers again.

>>3079854
i will respectfully disagree. as long as first world nations continue to subsidize the existence of rapidly breeding populations that cannot sustain themselves on their own, the population will continue to increase and the population increasing will be the most undesirable of humans to boot.

>>3079860
>>all of Asia has been below replacement fertility for 2 decades
>>All of South America has been below replacement fertility for as long
>>All of North Africa has been below replacement fertility as long

>>"...as the quality of life increases, the avarage number of children decrases"

>>3079882
Disagree with math all you like; it doesn't tend to notice.

>>3079854
Ugh... a temporary population decrease due to novel factors doesn't invalidate the inherently exponential-until-restrained nature of population growth.

At novel levels of luxury and entertainment, a considerable fraction of the human population is no longer interested enough in breeding to breed above replacement (i.e. switching from exponential growth to exponential decline). This is a selection event, a partial extinction, and could never produce a long-term stability.

In the face of that kind of selective pressure, humanity will either go extinct (NOBODY can sustain enough interest in breeding to breed above replacement) or humanity will evolve (some fraction of the population has a genetically predisposition to breed above replacement and grows exponentially until it is the majority, and humanity thereby resumes exponential population growth until restrained by misery and death).

And the smart money is on evolution. Assuming that there is no true-breeding instinct to breed regardless of entertainments available anywhere in the human population is pants-on-head retarded.

>>3079891
>>3079885

Let me help with that.

https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/fields/2002.html?countryName=World&c
ountryCode=xx&regionCode=oc&#xx

These are the current (2011 est.) growth rates for countries.

You'll notice the highest growth rates are in the countries with the lowest qualities of life.

Why are upwards of like 80% of the people in this thread mentally retarded?

>>3079909

Something in the water?

>>3079909
Because we're talking about Utopia. Sensible people see obvious problems and quickly become dismissive and lose interest, leaving the discussion mostly to idiots.

>>3079917

>doesn't realize he just called himself an idiot

>>3078468

>100% efficient transport
Lisa! In this house we obey the laws of thermodynamics!

>Panoptic surveillance
Sure is Big Bro in here.

>Concentric railway
Too centralized, leaves no room for extra construction (Then again it's a fucking island)

>Footage stored in a database
Well that solves the problem of heating in winter, people can just huddle close to the computers as they churn out waste heat and the whole island gets hot enough for spontaneous pair-production.

>GOLD STATUE
No.

>Splitting people by specialities
Gee putting the intellectuals in their ivory towers and the rest in cleaning the toilets sure sounds like a good plan to breed Harmony and Love.

>Every relevant field ever
Intellectual scarcity, if not resource scarcity.

Because you sampling rate is retarded

>>3079905
>>3079900
Both of you need to look up 'demographic momentum' and 'second demographic transition' and get back to me in a day or two.
The critical number to discuss the future of populations is total fertility rate, or TFR; it tells you how many children on average are being born to the current cohort of fertile women in an area. TFR has been dropping on a global scale for 40+ years and is still dropping, including to below what demographers though was the theoretical minimum just 15 years ago in some regions.

That means that even if every woman on the planet suddenly became a Mormon or a Catholic *today* we would STILL have a population peak and then decline [remember how I asked you to look up 'demographic momentum'?].
Protip: human population growth has NEVER BEEN 'exponential' except on a very small scale.

tl;dr: why is the only Christian Preacher that scientists never question Malthus?

>>3079917

More like we create valid arguments and your environmental/social conditioning brings you to the conclusion this is stupid and you start ad hominem'ening everything.

>>3079929
>doesn't realize that "quickly" doesn't mean "instantaneously" and "mostly" doesn't mean "entirely"

>>3078471

>Evenly spaced entertainment
And then folks decide they want to go to X, not Y, it becomes more cost-effective to expand X and destroy Y, thus destroying the glorious radial symmetry of the nation.

>Sex parlor with imported hotness
Sure is hedonist communists in here.

>>3078474

>Universal truths, principles, facts
Getting the popcorn ready.

>Don't pay taxes? Stick this electrode into your rectum and touch this bonobo's balls. For science.
Sure is ethics in here.

>Religion as a historic theory
You mean hypotheses?

>In the future everyone will wear silver jumpsuits, the togas of Future Rome.
Nope.

>>3079891
>hurr durr i lurvs science and MATH sayz that dumb, poor, etc. people who are proven to breed like rabbits will stop breeding cuz of a magical number even though their existence and behavior is fully subsidized and promoted by first world nations

>>3079939

I, uh, I was actually giving you evidence to support your viewpoint.

>>3079959

I don't follow. He was saying coutries with low quality of life have negative growth, you said countries with high quality of life had negative growth.

>>3079963

Oh, whoops. Maybe i responded to the wrong person.

I'm multitasking a bit and i may have just skimmed the thread.

>>3079939
>Protip: human population growth has NEVER BEEN 'exponential' except on a very small scale.
Protip: human population growth has USUALLY BEEN constrained by misery and death, except after times of extra bonus misery and death that made some headroom for unrestrained exponential population growth to go on for a while.

Why can't you get it through your thick skull that NOBODY has been saying exponential population GROWTH is inevitable REGARDLESS of misery and death, but rather that it is the CONSTRAINT by misery and death that is inevitable, and exponential population growth is the MEANS by which we reach conditions bad enough to achieve these constraints.

>>3079970

Europe has no misery and death to prevent exponential growth, so acording to you the population should be booming.
Well ques what, it is not.
People don't actually want many children. The reson that les developed countires have such high population growth is because of numerous reasons such as the lack of contraceptives and the fact that many children don't even get to live to adulthood. They have so many children because of neccesity, not because they want to.

>>3079970

I've done some quick reading on the oldfag's argument, and it seems like the professionals are predicting a population crest.

This is happening however because they are taking into account the spread and mass use of contraception and other programs to control population. They do not make an argument that population growth will stop growing automatically in a system that would otherwise support a higher population.

>>3079954
Sweet fuck you are stupid.
If you were to actually look up TFR you'd find out that such shining beacons of wealth as El Salvador, Tunisia, North Korea, Vietnam, and Lebanon have been well below replacement fertility for a long-ass time. Some of the lowest levels of fertility are in places like Lithuania, Belarus, Ukraine, and Serbia.
You can HURR DURR all you want, but the fact that Niger (with a death rate and life expectancy that looks like a Russian Roulette Championship) is above replacement fertility doesn't mean fuck-all on a continental scale, let alone global.

>>3079998
>acording to you the population should be booming

Read the fucking thread so you don't pull it in circles:
>>3079900

>>3080001
What the shit? People who can't afford to feed their children (and aren't supported by charity or welfare) ALSO breed below replacement?!

WHAT A NOVEL AND RELEVANT INSIGHT

protip: society will always be shit, I'd tell you why, but I think Chuck Palahnuik said it best:

"People don't want their lives fixed. Nobody wants their problems solved. Their dramas. Their distractions. Their stories resolved. Their messes cleaned up. Because what would they have left? Just the big scary unknown."

People are idiots who define themselves by idiotic obstacles. Case in point: This thread.

>>3079963
Pretty soon the world will have negative growth

>>3079970
Because some of the lowest fertility levels are in well-developed nations with no misery and death, genius. Sure, some are shit-holes, but some are Sweden and Japan (who has the lowest fertility).
Obviously misery and death aren't necessary to constrain human population growth.
Also, some of the greatest advances in tech and quality of life occurred while population growth was highest.
in short - you're wrong
>>3080000
1) Nice get
2) you stopped reading too soon. the Second demographic Transition is the name for the phenomenon that fertility is dropping in places regardless of access to advanced birth control, education, wealth, etc. Indeed, guys like Longman and Kaufmann are *demonstrating* that human populations are shrinking despite vast opportunities for growth.

>>3080025
>Chuck Palahnuik said it best:

>>3080023
Yeah, and it also refutes decades of data from pre-1970 or so and refutes a ton of current theories on why overpopulation is real, regardless of empirical evidence

>>3080001
>doesn't mean fuck-all on a continental scale, let alone global.

im not one to think we have an over population problem, but youre retarded if you think the population hasnt been growing at an accelerated rate

>>3080032
>Because some of the lowest fertility levels are in well-developed nations with no misery and death, genius.
Jesus fucking Christ in Hell...

I COVERED THIS. WHY CAN'T YOU REMEMBER A POST YOU HAD JUST DIRECTLY REPLIED TO?
>>3079900

This is one of those cases where if you weren't too stupid to argue with productively, we wouldn't have got into an argument in the first place.

>>3080032
I'm still waiting for you to explain the mechanism that will cause a negative growth. Something that's not:

>hurr math told me

>>3080043
No, I just can read journals about, you know, actual population growth rates, fertility, etc.

You should try it

>>3080051
your "argument" is basically "herp derp dont care about the fact that the data directly proves me wrong its gonna go away soon anyway because i said so"

>>3080042
>>people in some places aren't having children because they can't afford to feed them, while people in other places are having children they can't afford to feed and letting them starve
>this proves there is no overpopulation
Some people you just can't reason with.

>>3080034

What just because he doesn't have five PhD's in fields you deem to be legit everything he says is false or unworthy?

I remember when I was an angst-ridden 15 year old.

>>3080051
Fertility in well-developed nations has been declining for 3 generations - so much for
>>novel levels of luxury and entertainment
Huh?
Also, you appear to be ignorant of past population declines that were not associated with economic contraction, plague, etc. that also weren't solved by 'evolution' nor followed by exponential population growth, but were rather followed by rather gradual population growth over long periods of time, despite ample resources for greater growth.
You didn't "cover this" you waved your hands and said 'ooh, magic!'.

>>3080082
why are you talking about fertility decline of well-developed nations and extrapolating that to global population? everyone has known for ages that fertility rates decline as wealth increases. the poorest dumbest people are the ones breeding at an ACCELERATING rate, and "developed nations" are paying for it out of their own pocket. please stop being so cocky and give us information we *dont* know or stfu

>>3080052
It is very simple.
People aren't having kids.
The end.
Rich people aren't having kids; poor people aren't having kids; educated people aren't having kids; ignorant people aren't having kids; Asians aren't having kids; Europeans aren't having Kids; Australians aren't having kids; North and South Americans aren't having kids; North Africans aren't having kids; Sub-Saharan Africans ARE having kids, but nowhere near enough, and they are having fewer and fewer each year.

Get it now? Unless the average woman has 2.2 kids in her lifetime [this is called TFR), population will eventually go down. Global TFR has been dropping for AT LEAST 40 years, so there is also population momentum pointing down (the women who are below the age of the current TFR cohort are a smaller group than their own mothers, so their total number of kids will also be smaller).

Nothing to do about it, now - world population will peak and then will decline sharply, the end.

>>3080060
Arbitrarily extrapolating data points is not proving anything, let alone disproving fundamental mathematical principles.

If all people lose interest in breeding above replacement due to a permanently improved standard of living resulting from technological advancement, that's an extinction trend, not a stability trend.

If there's some segment of the population that maintains interest in breeding above replacement in the face of this improved standard of living, that's an exponential growth trend for that segment, which will continue until resources are insufficient to support it and population is constrained largely by war and poverty.

It's possible for one segment of the population with a certain trait to be on a rapid extinction track and another without the trait to be on an exponential growth track. This is an example of a major selection event in the evolution of a species. It is not an example of "balance" or "stability".

>>3080101

Unless of course we nip the ageing problem in the bud, which would lead to a stable but slower rate of growth.

Hmm. That helps eliminate one of the arguments against longevity tech. Nice.

>>3080101
links? when did this "not having kids" trend occur exactly? was it fairly recent and now you want to pretend its a long term trend? common knowledge says youre wrong, but i want to believe and i dont trust common knowledge anyway. can you please provide some nice links for me to read?

>>3080118

Most of the numbers I see are represented here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographic_transition

Some of you sound pretty derpish to me. It's common knowledge that industrialization stops overpopulation. Education is the key.

http://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_on_global_population_growth.html

>>3080065
Wow, you can't understand a simple thread. let me explain this in simple terms.

The fact that wealthier. better-educated women have fewer kids has been known for, oh, 90 years or so. But about 45 years ago some scientist began noticing that, globally, *all* women were having fewer kids, regardless of their wealth and education. Sure, the wealthier and better-educated were still leading the pack on least kids, but it was spreading everywhere.
And it still is. TFR, which I have described here a few times already, is how you can predict future population levels accurately. The TFR of Europe, South America, and Asia has been so low for so long that world population will (or already has) peak and then decline.

Its already done; can't be stopped. the only reason that the population is still growing is because people live so much longer; but once the Boomers start dying off, the population is going to drop like a rock because there just aren't that many young people.

>>3080101
>world population will peak and then will decline sharply, the end.
Not "the end". What then?

"World population will peak and then decline sharply to extinction, the end."? Ridiculous.

"World population will peak and then decline sharply, and then stabilize forever in a peaceful happy utopia, the end."? Even more laughable.

"World population will peak and then decline sharply, and then resume exponential growth until misery resulting from overpopulation constrains it, until living space can be expanded, and so on and so forth without end."?

You can't just look some arbitrary distance into the future and say, "the end" like that's the end of all history just because you don't want to be bothered about what happens afterward.

>>3080118
http://www (dot) rickety (dot) us/2009/10/world-total-fertility-rate-declines/

nationmaster also has good charts on this. Or the demography Matters blog

>>3080140
I meant 'the end' as in 'the fact that human population will peak and then decline is irrefutable'. it simply is true.
what ahppens after that? well, the good thing about unsustainable trends is that they end. The Demographer Kaufmann has a theory (pic related)

>>3080140

I vote this:

"stabilize forever in a peaceful happy utopia"

Look at Japan. They have some population decline. They just build robots to replace the people workers though ;-).....well, at least, that's what will happen in my Utopia....

>>3080156

I believe I speak for most of /sci/ when I say either:

a) Over my dead body.

or b) Fuck this, we're going to go live on Mars.

>>3080164
Japan is terrified of population decline! They are already forced to import workers and one department estimated that within 15 years 1/3rd of all native Japanese workers will be needed just to care for the elderly.

Also, you have to worry about dependency ratios and, also - who is going to build those robots?

>>3080165
Yes, over your dead body because when you die you won't leave enough kids behind. Also, why colonize Mars when your colony would just die out later due to low fertility?

>>3080165
>over my dead body

oh are you going to give your life to trolling on the net to convert as many teenagers into atheists so the "religious dont inherit the earth" like all atheists do now? cute.

>venus project
founded by a bunch of people that slurp up the conspiracy kool-aid of zietgiest

>trs
what is dis?

>>3080118
This has been a trend for industrializing nations since they started industrializing.

The key factors are:
- Contraceptives
- Emancipation/Suffrage
- Improved working conditions
- Education

As a country industrializes, birth rates drop. Russia/Eastern Europe and Japan already have negative population growth. Most western countries only have positive population growth thanks to immigration. The United Nations has put together a host of data regarding population growth, and predictions point to a 9 billion peak in 2050, followed by a decline.

http://www.un.org/popin/

>>3080188

No. I will not.

>>3080185

It is possible to incentivise fertility to trigger population growth. And the death rate still has a ways to drop.

>>3080134
Ugh. Observing that "globally, *all* women were having fewer kids, regardless of their wealth and education" doesn't mean that it's for the same reason everywhere. It's not even true that all women are having fewer kids, only that on average women are having fewer kids and not all of the ones having fewer kids live in rich countries.

You didn't even try to address or dispute the fact (which you were just called out on) that you just claimed that women too poor to afford to feed children not having children proves there is no such thing as overpopulation.

>>3080190

TRS = Technocratic Republic of /sci/

>>3080156
>I meant 'the end' as in 'the fact that human population will peak and then decline is irrefutable'. it simply is true.
That's an incredibly fucking stupid to say about an extrapolation of trends. The future is not that predictable.

>what ahppens after that? well, the good thing about unsustainable trends is that they end.
Oh good fucking job, you moron.

This whole fucking time, NOBODY was talking about some temporary trend in the population over the next couple of centuries but you. You haven't even been talking about the same thing as the rest of the people in this discussion, the ones you keep insisting are "wrong" and "ignorant".

Words can not express what a complete fucking assclown you are.

>>3080192
Past UN population projections have been high and late, so I suspect that these are, too

>>3080202
Sweden, russia, Singapore, and Japan are all trying to incentivize fertility. So far, it hasn't worked

>>3080217
>>Observing that "globally, *all* women were having fewer kids, regardless of their wealth and education" doesn't mean that it's for the same reason everywhere

Which, of course, I never said or implied.

>>You didn't even try to address or dispute the fact (which you were just called out on) that you just claimed that women too poor to afford to feed children not having children proves there is no such thing as overpopulation.

Because I didn't say that, dumbass. I said that TFR is declining. I pointed out that it is declining amongst the poor as well as the rich, and I mocked a moron about a lame statement about 'people who can't feed their kids aren't having them'.

>>3080256
>>That's an incredibly fucking stupid to say about an extrapolation of trends

Is the math too hard for you to understand? Or have you simply not looked at it? Human population will peak, within the lifetime of people now born, then decline sharply. Fact. Done. You can't change it without a massive cloning program.
Read 'the Empty Cradel' by Longman, or any of the related works.

>>"...some temporary trend in the population over the next couple of centuries..."

You mean like the 2-3 decades of high, yet anomalous, growth that led to 'The Population Bomb' and 'Soylent Green'?

>>3080133

This is actually a really good resource.

>>3080293
You gave North Korea as an example of a poor country with a reduced birth rate, and you're going to sit there and mock anyone who suggests women being too malnourished for pregnancy or knowing that they wouldn't be able to feed their children as an explanation for that?

>>3080293

The trick is to select members of your starting population who agree to a set number of children which must be produced in order to ensure population growth.

So less 'incentivise' and more 'contractually obligated.'

In before "gubmint control". That's the point.

>>3080327
>Is the math too hard for you to understand?
Apparently the relation between the math and the reality is far beyond your meagre intellectual resources.

You can't just extrapolate trends and say, "This is a fact of the future. This will happen, exactly as the extrapolation says, and if you disagree you are educated stupid. Timecube predicts all future."

>>3080327
>You mean like the 2-3 decades of high, yet anomalous, growth that led to 'The Population Bomb' and 'Soylent Green'?
Yes, that is a perfect example of extrapolating a trend to reach a stupid level of confidence in a prediction about the future. It is exactly what you're doing here.

What I am doing here, on the other hand, is talking about timeless mathematical realities and the constraints they place on eternal utopian fantasies such as a "post-scarcity" future. I'm not talking about specific predictions for specific times in the future, but the existence of bounds which mean no such fantasies of infinite wealth can play out in reality.

I just want you to understand on how many levels you are simultaneously being a complete fucking moron.

>>3080333
What gave you that idea? I am trying to point out that fertility is dropping across the board. Historically, poor women had more children, but that is changing in many places; that was my point.

yumad.jpg

>>3080352
>>math might say that if you drop a rock it will fall, but that isn't reality

>>3080402
Am i being a dick? Sure; there is a lot of that going around. But a moron? Hardly.

When I read some sub-literate fool complaining about 'exponential growth, blah, blah, blah' I point out that overpopulation has never been a problem and certainly won't be for centuries. When a bunch of morons who don't know what total fertility rate is and have never looked up even the UN's World Population projections start explaining 'u r stoopid, shut up, overpopulation is teh bad' I point out that actually DEpopulation is a real problem at the time.

For all i know, the rapid decline of population in the next 100-200 years might make the post-scarcity guys more right than wrong. But *if* we are going to talk about the impact of population on social and economic areas, let's realize that the future will have a lot less people, not more.

I would rather spend my own money on a private self-sustaining farm in Costa Rica, with WiMax internet and solar/hydro energy, using the latest fabrication and 3d printing technology.

Have fun living in a glorified apartment complex, plebeians.

>>3080491
>Am i being a dick? Sure; there is a lot of that going around. But a moron? Hardly.

>paragraphs demonstrating a complete failure to understand the contents of the post he is replying to

It's like I said before: some people are just too stupid to argue with.

>post-scarcity
>zeitgeist
>resource based economy
>Chuck Palahnuik
>venus project

Hilarious.

>>3080506
Have fun living in the past.

>>3080293

>Sweden ... trying to incentivise fertility

By outlawing sperm donor anonymity? Good luck with that.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18991243